One obsessive Canadian's review of everything going on in Lucha Libre.

Sunday, June 26, 2011

AAA Triplemania XIX Thoughts

Argos, Aero Star, Fenix, Sugi vs Dark Dragon, Tito Santana, Tigre Cota, Decnis: Only saw quick highlights on youtube of the middle portion of the match. Seemed like a total divefest but sadly cut off before the finish. Would love to see this pop up randomly on an AAA TV show sometime in the future or via super duper secret handheld.

Cynthia Moreno, Fabi Apache, Mari Apache, Lolita vs Sexy Star, Angelina Love, Velvet Sky, Mickie James: Shockingly not as terrible as I expected. The TNA chicks seemed really confused at first and were standing on the apron during the beatdown waiting to be tagged in. I guess Mari got a memo before the match saying be nice because there were no hard forearms and when she did her senton bomb she barely touched the TNA chick. I'm sure that made a lot of people from the luchablog community very unhappy.:) Crowd seemed to be really into the match which might have made it better than it was. Lolita didn't get to show much but she looked fantastic in the 30 seconds she got. Big dive sequence at the end and then Mickie kissed Fabi and pinned her. Lesbianism as a distraction? Whatever works.

During that first match I noticed the first few rows were filled with folks who you would never catch dead at any random AAA TV taping. Shows you that major events draw a different kind of crowd and that's why you need to go all out with the entrances and big stars. It's an EVENT, not a Lucha Libre show.

Heavy Metal, Joe Lider, Electro Shock vs Chessman, Silver King, Ultimo Gladiador (TLC): Chessman's entrance was AWESOME! Same for Silver King/Ultimo Gladiador. Match was a total cluster as you'd expect. The camerawork was absolutely terrible which took away from the match. They missed the three biggest spots of the match - Chessman spearing Heavy Metal through some chairs, Nicho doing a run-in somersault legdrop through a table and Joe Lider's Spanish Fly to the floor through a table on Silver King. Inexcusable misses since each spot took lots of time to set up so you knew something was coming. I was mad the little guys never got involved and just stood around watching the festivities. Not sure why the women were even out there or that other dude. Finish was a letdown considering you had tons of ladders, tables and chairs around and instead it was just two guys falling off the top rope onto random objects.

La Parka, Octagon, Ozz, Drago vs Cibernetico, Charly Manson, Escoria, Billy el Malo: Still not a fan of Cibernetico getting a seperate entrance from his own group. It makes them come off weak (something they don't need any help with) and makes no sense if the leader doesn't want to be with his buddies. On the other hand Drago had THE BEST ENTRANCE OF THE ENTIRE SHOW! That was some epic stuff right there. Match was alright although a bit messy at times. I bet nobody noticed b/c the camera was doing funny things but Manson/Escoria/Billy did an awesome spot early on. Comeback was great with Drago doing a huge dive (camera caught it!). Each tecnico got a little showcase with Ozz's being disappointing and Drago's being the best. They teased a double submission finish and then did a dive sequence with Charly Manson trying to show off busting out the Brillo Dorado but I thought he ended up looking dumb b/c he was going to slow and almost hit his head on the apron. Bullet tope, Charly. Use it. You're good at it. Drago finished things with an awesome asai tornillo! Finish was that angle with Taboo and Parka's kid. It was a decent enough angle but completely unbelievable if you try to actually think about it. I'm not even sure what changed here. Taboo was with the Bizarros beforehand and still is now. So how was this a big plan to hurt Parka? I guess these guys will have some sort of big match at Verano De Escandalo or Heroes Inmortales in exchange for being stuck in the middle of the card here.

Extreme Tiger/Jack Evans vs Mr. Anderson/Abyss (Cage - AAA Tag Team Titles): Was it just me or was it hard to watch this? The cage seemed hard to see through and the extra platform above it made it even harder to peek into the cage with the roaming camerashot. They seemed to be doing some complicated spots early on but it was hard to follow. Less than 4 minutes into the match Tiger climbed to the top of the structure above the ring and did a tornillo which was INSANE, so much so that Abyss was getting out of the way without even being hit. Tiger escaped first leaving it two-on-one vs Jack which was the right call. With this being a TNA show I assumed it would be two-on-one vs one of the heels and Bryan Alvarez would flip out. Anderson escaped next and in doing so got his easiest payday yet since I can't remember if he did ANYTHING in this match. Abyss and Jack did a complicated spot that was supposed to end with a frankensteiner but Abyss botched it. Finish was very silly as Jack climbed the cage and the crowd cheered b/c he was sitting on the top so the match was over. But Abyss poured out some thumbtacks and began climbing (2 minutes later). For whatever reason this caused Jack to slide down to meet him halfway and then power bomb him onto the thumbtacks and then climb back up to do a plancha off the cage which in very un-Jack-like fashion was very awkward. He then climbed back up top and they played his music too early which led to the camera cutting to a crowdshot and they missed the entire awesome finish where Anderson wouldn't let Jack's feet hit the floor so Jack rammed him into the cage and then moonsaulted off to the floor. If AAA is serious about running PPV's they may want to clue the PPV guys into what camerashots they need to be ready for.

Psycho Circus vs Perros Del Mal (AAA Trios Titles): Color me confused as I had no idea there was a fourth clown running around until a few minutes into the match. That ain't no mini. Usual brawl you'd expect with these teams but very enjoyable. Since it was the big show everyone was taking big bumps and they pulled out all the stops including a PLANCHA TO THE FLOOR BY MONSTER CLOWN! I can't believe 40-year old Damian was taking hiptosses onto the entrance ramp and hard whips into tables. That man tries hard and/or wanted to make sure the Perros brand stays over even with Perrito doing all he can to make sure it dies. Monster/Damian took each other out with a suplex into a bunch of equipment that exploded. Back when the WWF did this spot the entire power in the arena went out to explain why that equipment was located there. In AAA the power in the arena didn't go out so we are just to assume the AAA production staff leaves random explosive devices laying around. SAFETY FIRST KIDS! X-Fly took a brutal bump when he somersaulted off the top rope to the floor onto a garbage can. Halloween won the match with a top rope Death Valley Driver on Psycho Clown. Great effort by both teams. My only complaint here would be the DTU-ness of the match. It looked so amateur having the ringside crew removing weapons/tables after they were used and then running up and down the ramp to set up the equipment Damian/Monster were going to demolish later in the match. I realize they were rushed for time but you have to either do this off-camera or not at all. Remember that spot on a recent WWE PPV where all the chairs fell onto The Miz (or some other dude)? Imagine if during the match you had seen all the WWE ringside dudes running back and forth to set the spot up in full view of everyone. It makes the product look terribly amateur. For DTU it's okay... that is a somewhat amateur product and they make no pretense about that. AAA is supposed to be professional and this was not even close to professional.

It was at this point I realized the last pinfall attempt (not including finishes obviously) I saw on this show was near the end of the women's match and that was when Hijo De Tirantes refused to count. There were no attemps to win in the TLC match, only two submission attempts in the four on four match, then we had a cage and finally the Clowns/Perros where the only pinfall attempted was the finish. Someone in charge backstage may want to clue the guys in next time to at least create a pretense that a match is going on instead of just a collection of spots until the ref says wrap things up.

El Zorro vs Jeff Jarrett (Mega Heavyweight Title): Was not looking forward to this but to be fair to these guys they stood no chance. Let's recap: The fans had just seen a TLC match with tons of stunts, a four on four match that was mostly all action, a cage match with dives from the top and a hardcore match with tons of stunts. Now you expect the fans to be okay with watching an old-school Jeff Jarrett match? Meltzer always mentions the 'death spot' on WWE PPV's being the match right before the main event and this was the death spot on this show. Not only the match right before the main event but also the match coming on after a stuntshow. They didn't stand a chance even if both had wrestled the match of their lives. Not to mention Zorro looked like walking death as he made his entrance. Jarrett's guitar shot only got a two count and the only reason it even got a pop was b/c nothing had happened in the match up until that point. We already saw guitar shots in an earlier match. He then had powder kicked into his own face which was very 80's. Finally he got the win to a very timid reaction. I'm sure he immediatly went on twitter to talk about how he started a riot. Easily the worst match on the show.

El Mesias vs L.A. Park (Hair vs Mask): I'm not sure if they were rushed for time, Mesias was unhappy, a huge mistake by the person that put the show together or all of the above but for whatever reason Mesias came out to the most generic entrance of his career. His entrances on regular AAA TV tapings are more dramatic. Park meanwhile had his son with him and also wheeled out Pierroth who unmasked himself and was crying. That was terribly sad and from all accounts Pierroth is basically an invalid who is out of it most of the day so I wonder if he even wanted to be there. I know it wasn't in mean spirit but if the real Noberto Salgado was around I wonder if he'd have wanted to go out there in his condition. As for the match - I liked it better than their Guerra De Titanes match. The GdT match lost it for me when Mesias kicked out of a tombstone and was on offense less than 20 seconds later. There are people who bashed the HHH/Taker from Mania as being finisher killing who raved about Park/Mesias from GdT. How dumb is that? They brawled around early on which was expected. The match didn't really get going until Park had his mask torn and both guys were a bloody mess. They both did big dives and hit their big moves for nearfalls. Park did his corkscrew bodyblock and barely clipped Mesias. Mesias did his finisher while we were watching a replay of something else. The spot of the match was Park setting up a table, doing his dance and getting speared through said table. It was criminal that wasn't the finish! One of the greatest nearfalls I've seen in a long time! Everyone seems to agree the finish was a letdown as there was a ref bump and Park used brass knux to KO Mesias. I still prefer that over the GdT ending. They shaved Mesias really quickly and Park celebrated with fans at ringside including mocking Marisela Pena who sure loves to be on TV. I thought the match was really good but in no way was it a MOTYC most people said. Perhaps you had to be there live to get the full effect. It was a fine match to headline a PPV and end a feud. What hurt them a lot was they relied so much on brutal chairshots, tables and brawling at ringside but we had already seen three matches so far that had all of that and more. AAA has certainly taken a turn for the hardcore over the past year under Konnan's leadership but it was really at an extreme on this show and hurt the product more than it helped.

Dr. Wagner Jr. vs Rob Van Dam(e) (Latin America Heavyweight Title): I'm already taking bets on whether we ever see this title defended. Actually I take that back. The belt is perfect for Wagner to defend when AAA asks him to lose a big match and instead of losing a belt that matters or his mask he can just offer up this pointless title. RVD had a pretty generic entrance. Wagner came out to mariachi music combined with Bad Medicine. Cheap. Match was alright, actually MUCH BETTER than I expected since I thought for sure Wagner and RVD wouldn't be able to get on the same page. But keep in mind I haven't seen RVD in many years and it was a surprise to me at how much he's slowed down. Crowd was dead tired and who can blame them? Not only was this show really long and the previous match was so intense - these guys once again started WRESTLING. You can't do that on a show that had a billion hardcore spots. Crowd only seemed to wake up when they went to the floor which shouldn't have surprised anyone who understands psychology. They ended up using a chair which was pretty tame compared to other weapons we had seen thus far (CELLO!). The nearfalls were done really well. RVD almost slipped off the top at one point when Wagner went to crotch him. RVD kicked out of the Wagner Driver and Wagner kicked out of the Five Star Frog Splash (is it still called that?). Another letdown of a finish as Wagner hit a DDT on RVD off the ropes for the win. I think RVD was supposed to take his wacky headstand bump but couldn't pull it off. Wagner closed the show celebrating with the AAA tecnicos who didn't make the show or weren't important enough to be in any big matches.

Overall it was a good show. It had it's ups and downs but more ups than downs in my opinion. I think the two major flaws were the match order and the usage of weapons. If you had changed the order up and told some of the guys to cut down on the weapons/gimmicks (i.e.: thumbtacks were pointless in a cage match) the show would have been much better. If I was in chrage I'd have put the show on in this order:

It would have taken a lot of convincing to get Wagner/RVD to work the opener but I think it could have been done and would have set a good precedent for future shows. The tradition in Mexico is to have the main events go on last but time's have changed and with such loaded shows you need to seperate your big matches to not burn the crowd out. I'm sure Wagner is a WWE fan and watched Wrestlemania so he knows starting the show with a big title match isn't "wrong". It would just take lots of convincing. By starting the show with that match it allows them to do their thing and if they run long you can cut time from MANY matches later on. Before the last three matches are due up you have all the hardcore stuff out of the way so Park/Mesias using chairs/tables will be more 'fresh' in the eyes of the fans. The women's match is the perfect match for the dead spot b/c action will be limited but the crowd will still be into it for the eye candy.

On a final note - was Leonardo Riano doing commentary on AAA TV while Arturo Rivera was sick and I just completely missed it? Or was he just added to this show b/c of his daddy connections? He seemed to be really up to date on what was going on with AAA which balanced out the fact that he was still annoying as ever and his mic just happened to be the only one that actually worked. Conspriacy theory! I know it's Televisa's decision on which announcers to use but you would think CMLL would be unhappy with one of their main guys working the biggest AAA show of the year.

I'll be back with a CMLL Juicio Final recap in January. Not because I'm lazy and won't update my blog until then but because CMLL is still stuck in 1989 and doesn't understand making money on DVD sales, PPV or treating your fans with respect.

Well everyone is entitled to their own opinion but I tend to respect the opinion of someone who actually identifies themself instead of hiding behind a fake name. Although I'm pretty sure I know who you are since you linked from Cubsfan's blog and write like a certain "expert".

THE TRUTH is you saw I wrote some thoughts and came to read it b/c you respect my opinion or at least are interested in what I have to say. I guarantee you the opposite is not true and I wouldn't blink if you wrote anything about anything.